After a long night’s sleep, broken often by all the tea I drank with the kaiseki lunch, I awake to a cloudless blue sky. I make myself a cup of tea to go with the pastries I subterfuged from breakfast yesterday, then lavish myself by reading in bed, a luxury in prevision of the train to the plane to China.
Impressions of Japan: Funny to see my Prius all over in the streets here. Lots of Starbucks... and 7/11s and even a Domino’s Pizza have colonized Kyoto. For business locally, there’s Boeing and Nintendo, plus sake-making due to the local spring water. So many kimonos (mostly tourists). Haven’t seen many gas stations. And I’ve seen not a single animal except one small dog on a leash in a T-shirt; not even pigeons, not even in the train stations. For a country that went to war under an emperor, occupied Manchuria and Korea, and flew hundreds of fighter planes halfway across the Pacific to bomb Pearl Harbor, I see few if any flags flying. Hard to find one small one for my prayer flags.
I’ll miss being understood - at least a bit - by most everyone (sales clerks, cab drivers...). Most people I’ve met speak some English. And I make the others laugh with my mimics. I’ll miss the soft, warm bathrobe in my room. I won’t miss those simpering child-woman voices in the elevators. I definitely won’t miss face masks; they make me feel like I should scrub in for surgery. Besides, what good does it do if you just have it over your mouth and not your nose? (One trendy girl at the airport wears a black one!)
I’ve come to Japan at the same time as a mild typhoon (which broke up off of Tokyo and didn’t make Kyoto), as the rugby world final in Yokohama (England will play South Africa next week-end; any bets on the winner?) and as the coronation of the 126th emperor, Naruhito. A very busy time!
Walk to the train station in plenty of time for the Haruka Limited Express to Kansai Airport outside Osaka. I see the train before mine leave, all decorated with flowers and Hello Kitty images. Actually that’s its name: the Hello Kitty Haruka. And when it arrives, my train has rhe same decoration; inside and out, right down to the headrests, it's all Hello Kitty. It’s at the platform half an hour before departure but, as in Tokyo, has to be cleaned, with a sign at the door of the car that says “We are sorry. Please do not enter while cleaning”. How very polite!After we can board, a group of four comes in and the gentleman swivels his two-seat row so it's facing the others. I saw the cleaners do that in Tokyo so that all seats faced “forward”, but I didn’t know just anybody could do it!
The rivers we cross (including in Kyoto) have steep banks and a much wider bed than the actual water in it. That may be wise as there have been nineteen typhoons this season, and record rain. As there are hills all around in the hinterland, I can only assume there’s a lot of snowmelt sometimes as well.Housing, both old and new, comes right up to the railroad tracks. Can’t be very restful. And it’s certainly not a picturesque view. Japanese houses and apartments seem small. (Tahiti and Hiva Oa also have small homes but people always seem to be outside, so little room is needed.) Do the Japanese entertain at home? All apartment buildings seem to have an outside stairway, maybe because of earthquakes? And yet there are many highways and train lines running on high stilts.
Near the airport there are lots of homes with truck gardens, surrounded by industry. A strange mix.
Then, after a long bridge, we reach Kansai Airport. Must have been built on landfill. There I manage to find a small Japanese flag, but one that the shop is using for decoration. After a bit of coaxing, they relent and sell it to me. Searching shops for it has taken up the time until check-in (as did the long line!). And the wait to board turns out to be a lot of time because there’s an air controller problem somewhere in China! (Isn’t that forbidden?) We leave over a half-hour late for the almost four-hour flight. As far as I can tell, I’m the only non-Asian on the plane. And, upon arrival, I'll be one of a literal handful of people in the “foreign” line at passport control.
The ground crew on the tarmac waves our plane good-bye. Got to love the Japanese! Finally, we head into the sun, going west, which seems strange because China is The Far East to Americans and Europeans. We fly over a long bridge, oyster beds, then nothing. The late sun turns the China Sea a fiery gold. Then Japan disappears beneath the clouds. I leave the Land of the Rising Sun, headed for the Middle Kingdom.
When we land in Beijing, it’s a totally different world. Immediately. The Japanese took their time; the Chinese mob the aisle to disembark. Then they cram onto the bus and don’t line up for the escalator (just like the French). And then there’s the man with his pant leg pulled up, furiously scratching his calf as if he has fleas.
But nothing looks more like one airport than another airport, even if there’s less signage in English here. One huge difference is the x-ray scan of your luggage after baggage claim! China is the only country I know of that does that. I’m glad I hid my camera in my backpack; walking around the airport with it around my neck might have raised suspicions among the many police and military in the hallways... a fact the National Geographic man, Stanley Wen, agrees with when I reach the hotel. (An airport young man with a National Geographic sign escorted me to the big car sent out to fetch me... no stubby Hondas here as in Kyoto.)Stanley goes over the schedule with me in the plush hotel lobby. (Is this really Communist China, this opulent capitalistic luxury?) He tries to find out whether or not the zipline near the Great Wall still exists, but can’t. I’ll find out tomorrow morning when the guide arrives at 9. We say goodnight, the bellboy takes me to my posh room - into which five of my Japanese rooms would fit - and I slip between the sheets after a shower.
It’s been quite a travel day!
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